VanDusen Botanical Center to Be Canada’s First Living Building

With construction already underway, the VanDusen Botanical Garden Visitor Centre in Vancouver is expected to be Canada's first certified Living Building. The super green visitor center was designed by Busby Perkins + Will to reflect the very nature its botanical gardens, and it relies on plants to amplify its green status. The building is anticipated to be completed the spring of 2011 and has been designed to LEED Platinum standards, featuring a green roof and net-zero energy consumption.

The design for the visitor center was inspired by the leaves of an orchid — its wings consists of ‘petals’ that shoot off from the ‘stem’, which serve as the central atrium and lobby. The stem has been built from rammed earth and features a vaulted ceiling and roof constructed from prefab wood-glue laminated beams made by StructureCraft Builders Inc. A glass tower in the atrium infuses the center with natural daylight and also serves as a solar chimney that exhausts hot air. Grass and colorful floral bulbs will be planted on the undulating green roof, which will also direct rain into underground cisterns for use around the center.

A photovoltaic system on the roof will generate electricity for the center, and hot water will be provided by a biomass boiler fed by dry wood waste reclaimed from the surrounding area. Totally off-grid, the center will provide all of its own power and will source all of its own water from rain catchment, storm water and black water recycling.